it’s like you believe you can tariff them expecting they won’t do the same. Why do you believe the rest of the world is not going to retaliate and why do you believe America can prosper without the rest of the world?
What’s the point of having a military alliance with countries you puts tariffs on? That’s unfriendly to say the least.
because there’s a war coming soon that will destroy most global trade. trump wants the US in a better position in that near future by having more factories and such inside of the US.
in a peaceful world, you allow free trade and specialization to do its thing and everybody gets richer. you farm bananas, i farm apples, and we trade. we create value out of thin air, it’s an amazing thing.
but in a world where superpowers are at war and the world splinters into factions, half of the global economy will be cut off from the other half. therefore it’ll be a huge liability if we for example depend on Taiwan for 90% of our computer chips when China can blockade Taiwan and we cannot reliably break that blockade. that’s one industry… now imagine the thousands of other products we need for a modern economy. it would cause massive economic shockwaves.
so this tariff thing is accepting that this will happen in the near future and preparing for it, slowly weaning off the economy from that connection to the rest of the world. so when it does come, it doesn’t hurt as bad.
it doesn’t really matter if you piss off your allies. since you’re the biggest military power they are going to have to rely on you anyway. you have leverage over them. the difference is that Trump is a reality TV star and so he is loudly exploiting this leverage whereas most past leaders would be more subtle and diplomatic about it.
Canada, Mexico, Germany, Japan, etc aren’t really allies. Being someone’s ally implies there’s a sort of equal footing. When someone has no choice but to bend to your will, is that a voluntary relationship? the US essentially wrote Japan’s constitution and they told the Germans what to write down for theirs. Canada and Mexico are heavily dependent on US trade- US growth might slow a half percent or two whereas Mexico and Canada are liable to fall into a recession because of these tariffs.
it isn’t equal footing. it’s a david v goliath situation
to give a recent example, Ukraine. Ukraine in 2014 had the Euromaidan coup and the president had to flee the country. The new government that was quickly appointed without an election realized one thing very quickly- Russia was about to invade them. they had only one option in terms of getting military aid and that was the US. so immediately, the same day that the government was appointed, they started cooperating with the US. a few days after that, little green men showed up in Donbas and the Russian army waltzed into Crimea
so you can say they “allied” with the US but a more honest way to say it is that they were desperately pushed into America’s orbit. and the US ultimately doesn’t care about a country like Ukraine. people are starting to see it more clearly today because of Trump, but I honestly don’t think the situation would have been meaningfully different with Biden or Kamala. The primary difference would have been rhetoric. Instead of calling Zelensky a dictator, we would have just dragged our feet with military aid instead, like what has been happening the last year or so
tldr: the US is a imperialist superpower and this is what they do.
trump wants the US in a better position in that near future by having more factories and such inside of the US.
Trump isn’t doing this because he’s some brilliant strategist. He’s a fascist and fascists require enemies to scare their subjects into complicity. If no enemies exist, they are created.
If no enemies exist, they are created.
i don’t disagree. that’s why the rhetoric. but I would disconnect the rhetoric from the policy. trump says one thing and does another. he wants to deport everyone but at the rate he’s going we won’t even see a 10% reduction in the illegal immigrant population. mouth says one thing, hand does another
notice how tariffs were a trend that started a decade ago. Trump placed tariffs on China on his first term and then Biden increased the number of tariffs. the ban on Tiktok was a bipartisan effort- it’s in the interest of US foreign policy. obviously tariffs on Canada and Mexico are insane and probably wouldn’t have happened without Trump… but more tariffs were a definite part of the future regardless who won in 2024
Trump isn’t doing this because he’s some brilliant strategist
couple of things. first, i wouldn’t underestimate trump. he successfully hijacked the Republican party which is a party full of wealthy and powerful people who did everything in their power to try and stop him
second, the people around Trump are very principled ideologues (ie people like Peter Thiel and the dark enlightenment ideology they’re enamored in)
these people are educated, intelligent, and dedicated to their cause. they also have near-limitless money and now they have the control of the federal government of the strongest country in the world- a country that has an executive branch that has gotten progressively more powerful.
they have a vision and they planned for this and they are enacting it. this is not a spontaneous thing. they view a future where there is a showdown with China and tariffs play into that future
Well look at Zelensky shall we? Throws the Christians in jail
Proof please. Fox is not a news source
You have no clue what David v Goliath means, do you.
the analogy was in reference to the size differential between david (boy) and goliath (giant)
sure david wins in the parable but to quote bo burnham
South of queers, north of Hell
The queer ones suck and the brown ones smell
We guard the border and we guard it well
But some slip through the cracks of the Liberty Bell
Did I say liberty? I meant taco, Paco, hey you better let that rock go
'Cause in real life, Goliath wins
And then sells all the silk that the widow spins
You underestimate how grossly unqualified everyone at the top is in the US. Anyone who’s even remotely qualified to lead the military is being replaced with sycophants. The US has never been weaker, which is exacerbated by the fact that any allies that could provide warnings of an attack, just won’t. Since our intelligence agencies have been neutering any early warning systems set in place, we will not see it coming, or worse, ignore it, because like the parable, an extremely incompetent group of leadership thinks it’s too big to fail, when in reality, wouldn’t take a huge enemy to win.
Bo Burnham sounds like a fucking idiot. Despite his size, Goliath was defeated by a well placed projectile.
The only way a war is coming for the U.S. is if it’s a World War. If a new World War was coming, we would definitely want to be closer with our border countries than give our foreign enemies a chance. I don’t think there is a war coming, I think this all has to do with economics and the National Debt. War is a great way to get rid of National Debt and boost an economy, reduce numbers, etc. but right now, I’m just not seeing it.
I personally think a more likely issue would be that the WTO exchanges the U.S. Dollar with the Chinese Yuan especially as the U.S. lags further behind in exports while Chinese exports continue to grow.
I do think leaving Ukraine was, unfortunately, inevitable. For the U.S. it was a war of attrition and Russia out lasted what the U.S. could monetarily support. I truly hope that the EU is able to support their fight.
If a new World War was coming, we would definitely want to be closer with our border countries than give our foreign enemies a chance
think of it this way. let’s say WW3 kicks off with China tomorrow. Will Canada or Mexico suddenly ally with China?
Reality is that Canada and Mexico are totally dependent on US trade. It really doesn’t matter if you piss them off they’re gonna be forced to deal with you anyway.
80% of Mexican exports are to the US. 30% of their GDP is based on American trade. If US exports stopped tomorrow, Mexican economy would immediately enter a deep depression. They have no choice but to play nice, even with 25% tariffs.
Canada is similarly stuck. 75% of exports are to the US. 50% of their imports are from the US. 20% of their GDP is based on American trade.
If you took both Canadian and Mexican trade combined and compared it to the US economy, though, it wouldn’t even reach 5%. If trade with both of these countries were to stop tomorrow, America will suffer- but growth may slow by 0.5% or 1%. Both Canada and Mexico would see a depression.
America is like the sun in the solar system. Canada and Mexico have no choice but to fall into orbit around it. The total weight of the economic power is hard to understate.
Do you see why Trump feels like he has the power to do this? This is the point I was trying to make above. Historically US presidents have been more diplomatic and subtle about how to abuse the leverage that America has by the nature of being a superpower. Trump isn’t fundamentally different except he’s exploiting this leverage loudly and in an ugly and aggressive way.
In the past, presidents would play nice. Pretend like there was sovereignty and diplomacy, etc. But when Bill Clinton signed NAFTA… it was for the same reason. To dominate the economies of both Canada and Mexico. The difference is the rhetoric sounds much nicer.
After NAFTA was signed, subsidized US corn flooded the Mexican market, totally bankrupting millions of Mexican farmers. Wages in Mexico stagnated for decades because US needed cheap labor to build cars. In Canada, they became more and more reliant on exporting natural resources to the US.
We always need to remember US is an imperialist power. This is what empires do.
As for the upcoming war, I think it’s only a matter of time. But we’re talking a time scale of 5-10 years. We’re preparing for the future showdown. There will be one or two more flashpoints before the main war. Ukraine was one, Israel is another.
If we had to make an analogy with WW2, I’d say we’re roughly in mid ~1930s. Our Spanish Civil War is the Ukrainian war. Our Italian invasion of Ethiopia is the Israeli conflict. (Gaza, Israeli invasion of Syria, war with Lebanon, Iran, etc)
they have brain damage.
Our allies do!!?? /s
man this comment is, one of the comments of all time. I think.
No, the MAGATS
That’s… The joke…?
The president is a Russian asset
The people you need to hear from aren’t using Lemmy.
OP should try Truth Social, I hear it’s technically a Mastodon fork…
Whoa!!!
It’s mastodon? I thought it was a different fediverse platform.
https://www.pcmag.com/news/trumps-social-media-site-quietly-admits-its-based-on-mastodon
Trump’s Social Media Site Quietly Admits It’s Based on Mastodon
Mastodon had originally threatened to sue Trump’s ‘Truth Social’ site for allegedly violating its open-source license.
Oh so it was X before Twitter. Lmao
holy shit!
Gotta love the grift - how much did they sink on this thing? And then they just stole an open source project and tried to hide it.
What’s next, TrumpOS? Reskinned Ubuntu with wallpapers and icons for $300?
Actually - anyone want to join my OS dev team?
Can you imagine them federaring their content? What a stream of odd toots that would be!
Ew.
I mean, yeah, but it’s where they would actually find conservatives…
…ew.
“”“conservatives”“”. Sometimes I think the DNC is the last place to find actual conservatives these days.
the DNC is the last place to find actual conservatives these days.
There is a good reason for this. Money to win elections comes from CONSERVATIVE corporations and populism isn’t on their wish list.
Yeah.
- consolidated health spending for single-payer services with far less admin slop? Conservative.
- taxing like it’s 1945 to build and maintain infrastructure? Conservative.
- reliable and varies power source? Conservative.
I dunno what these guys are on about.
Conservative on sh.itjust.works appears to be conservatives.
I have my doubts about that. Most of the mass posters are too “conservative” and lean extremely hard into stereotypes. They take racism and bigotry just a bit too far in many cases and it doesn’t quite align with actual conservative bigots and racists that I know.
It wouldn’t be surprising if most of the “conservative” communities are part of the same troll farm that lives primarily on other instances.
This is all speculation, of course. But, organized campaigns to spread discourse on social media are real and some of these trolls are really good at what they do.
Nahh, they were pretty conservativy when I tried to interact with them.
Some of them are, you just have to scroll way way way down
Sadly true. We actively searched for alternatives when we realised other channels were getting too manipulative and full of hate. Those who stayed haven’t even realised it.
OP’s also not going to get an answer that’s interesting or helpful out of them even if you go to where they live and ask and don’t get immediately flamed for asking.
There’s no acceptable answer for it. I have plenty of conservative friends and I could make sense of voting for Trump the first time. Not for me, FUCK that, but not all Trump v1 supporters were racists and there were valid conservative reasons to vote for him. He was definitely an unknown, nobody could have told you with certainty how he would act once in office. I could have told you what I expected and it was about as horrible as I expected, but people often see things in politicians that they want to see, rather than seeing what’s really there.
But any of the “OK to vote for Trump v1” falls apart completely for Trump v2. We saw what his first term was like and especially how it ended. His campaign in 2024 was even more unhinged and less grounded in reality than in 2016. Voting for him in 2024 is really inexcusable.
The US will be unimaginably worse off by the time Trump leaves office this time, tariffs and tax cuts for the rich and inflation, it’s going to be bad for Americans on an individual level. On a global level, Trump will have shredded alliances and any goodwill we had built up over the past decades, while also validating and confirming the world’s worst concerns about us.
And when Trump does finally leave office, the people you want to hear from will largely feel like it was a phenomenal presidency. It is a cult and logic and reason don’t have anything to do with it.
I’d love to believe this, but cynical me is thinking about those conservatives that look at Milei in Argentina and legitimately think it’s going great.
To cripple the US so it is no longer a threat to Russia, and they can move in to “reclaim” all those Baltic nations and maybe even cop the EU.
Not just Russia. Any kind of meaningful restraint on multinational corps & billionaires requires international cooperation, or the entity just changes the region where it stores/performs/recognizes whatever thing.
I think we’re gonna learn the hard way its actually not okay to let corporations become more powerful than most nations.
If they were capable of thinking critically, they wouldn’t be Republicans in the first place.
Echo chamber problems lol.
Y’all have banned or bullied every single Republican or conservative person off this website.
You can’t talk to people who aren’t here.
Aren’t you a conservative? Are you banned? Is this real?
- Not a conservative.
- I am currently banned from like 30 different subs and like 10 of them I don’t think I even interacted with whatsoever.
- Is anything real? Won’t know till we die.
Still waiting on that source.
Fucking source for what?
Y’all have banned or bullied every single Republican or conservative person off this website.
On this dumbass claim of yours. Or are you admitting that it’s complete bullshit now and then?
How the fuck would I ever be able to prove that with any hard data? Use your fucking head you dolt.
You can see the takeover of the main “conservative” sub being turned into a place to mock conservatives. The repeated comments from many users across all the subs that they are straight up not welcome here.
Like unless you got some magical way to see every active user and their political ideology idk how the hell you expect me to prove anything like that with a verifiably source of any kind.
If you really don’t think this website bans or bullies conservatives off of it ask yourself how many conservatives to you see around here? Even in their own conservative subs they are constantly down voted into oblivion. They only have a handful of active users at any given time and even in my short time on Lemmy I have seen several people that posted there stop accessing the site altogether.
I stand by my original claim that y’all (the far left majority) of Lemmy have bullied or banned all of them off the site. I’m not even conservative and I’ve been banned from many subs and been told to fuck off in various ways since the day I made my account. A few people have even told me to kill myself in creative and beautiful ways.
No love for differing opinions on this website.
So you’re full of shit. Got it. Thanks.
All you have to do is look at what happened to the conservative community. There was a post asking whether it was meant for trolling conservatives or for actual discussion, and the resounding answer was that no conversation was possible with conservatives or anyone who holds right of center views.
There were a few lemmings who posted in support of allowing conservatives to have a place to chime in, and they were downvoted into oblivion.
That’s being bullied off of Lemmy, which is fine, communities are self organized and managed, and chasing away wrongthink is apparently what the vast majority of this platform wants.
Again, all of that is fine, but we shouldn’t pretend chasing those people off wasn’t the intended outcome, or that this isn’t an echo chamber.
I appreciate you reiterating my point much better than I was going to.
Very weird how some people are in denial about Lemmy and it’s treatment of users that don’t align politically with the majority.
Well if none of them can have an adult conversation that happens. I’ve “debated” with them on here and it devolved into Twitter. Insults, grand claims with no evidence. Yes, we’ve created an echo chamber where you have to actually prove what you say, and they couldn’t survive. I’m ok with that.
Source on that claim? I’ve seen you claim that a bunch on here, and I have yet to see any of it being true.
Hold up! The truth matters again‽ I thought I’d never see the day.
Probably the downvotes on his comment are a liiiitttttllllllleeeee bit indicative
I just wanted him to say he’s full of shit which he ended up saying in a long, winded response.
So that when the oligarchs assume full unchecked control of the US, no one will lift a finger to help the rest of us.
You’re speaking in the wrong verb tense there, buddy.
Is this question rhetorical? The people you’re addressing this question to aren’t on Lemmy. Try Fox News, lies social, or wherever other sewers the maggots live in.
They don’t care about cooperation, everything is a deal to them. If some other country has something, we don’t. The entire worldview of Republicans is just capitalism, if something can’t be framed in terms of profit it’s not worth pursuing.
They’re fucking Ferengis
Don’t insult Ferengis. They’re actually smart.
And comply with contracts
They’ve been whitewashed over time as ST gets farther from the left. The OG ferengi would only have complied with a contract if they thought they’d get caught breaking it, which is honestly a more accurate satire.
Rule of Acquisition #17: A contract is a contract is a contract… but only between Ferengi.
Sounds like you’ve got the lobes for business.
Ferengis were meant to be a caricature of our current society, so yes, Ferengi fits.
Simple bully logic. If you are bigger than someone else, simply hit and threatening them to get whatever you want. Works really well until all the victims gang up and fight back together.
That’s easy. Constitutionally, you can’t be President longer than 2 terms. Wartime emergency powers can stop elections, cementing power permanently.
In the United States war and martial law does not stop the election cycle. There is zero precedent to support this, even Roosevelt had to campaign during WW2. In fact, the constitution is quite clear on the opposite - it perscribes elections must be held, offering no mechanisms for deferment.
If precedent still mattered, that would be comforting.
Ditto for the Constitution
Ah, my favorite kind of poster.
One who posts a self-congratulatory “question” to a group who obviously isn’t going to read it and then never replies to any of the comments.
Do you think there are many republicans on this site?
I don’t even think the majority of American conservatives are on board with most of what’s happening. Some are, but they’re especially stupid and usually ideologically oriented to Trump rather than to the traditional brand of US conservatism.
they’re especially stupid
You know, I always try to avoid thinking that people with different opinions to mine are “stupid”, but it’s getting more and more difficult to credit republicans with being reasonable.
The traditional conservatives are suspiciously quiet right now, so I count them as fully complicit.
To be fair to them though, they did just get comprehensively voted out from everywhere. They don’t have a single majority to make any difference to anything. If I were them I’d be sitting back with a large bowl of popcorn going “yal’l voted for this, or at least didn’t vote against it, hope you enjoy getting the full force of this orange idiot right in the face”. But from the headlines I’ve read it would appear they’ve had a few things to say about Fart’s latest hot smelly air.
They’d still rather stay silent than break with Trump and ally with leftists. To be really fair, they deserve no fucking credit whatsoever.
That is factually untrue. They did not get voted out everywhere and it is somewhat silly to say so.
House: R- 218, D- 215 Senate: R- 53, D- 47
That is what I call a fair fight.
Your position is indefensible.
I did a bit of maths at school and I know 218>215, and 53>47.
That is what I call a minority in both places. If all D get together and say “no”, and all R get together and say “yes”, then where a simple majority is required it’ll be an R victory. Any D victory will need some Rs to either swing (and likely get fired), or abstain. Of course if a 2/3 majority is needed for something then R will need some D support to get it through.
